The Black Sleep
| runtime = 82 minutes | country = United States | language = English | budget = $225,000Tom Weaver, Interviews with B Science Fiction and Horror Movie Makers: Writers, Producers, Directors, Actors, Moguls and Makeup McFarland, 1 Jan 2006 p 211 | gross = }} The Black Sleep is a 1956 independently made American black-and-white horror film, scripted by John C. Higgins (from a story by Gerald Drayson Adams) and developed for producers Aubrey Schenck and Howard W. Koch, who had a four-picture finance-for-distribution arrangement with United Artists. The film was directed by Reginald LeBorg and stars Basil Rathbone, Lon Chaney Jr., John Carradine, Bela Lugosi (in his final film role), and Akim Tamiroff in a role originally written for Peter Lorre. In a supporting role is Ed Wood-regular Tor Johnson. The film was released as a double feature with the British science fiction monster film The Creeping Unknown. The Black Sleep was re-released in 1962 under the title Dr. Cadman's Secret. Plot Set in England in 1872, the story concerned a prominent, knighted surgeon whose wife has fallen into a coma caused by a deep-seated brain tumor. Due to medicine's state of the art at the time, he does not know how to reach the tumor without risking brain damage or death to the woman he loves, so he undertakes to secretly experiment on the brains of living, but involuntary, human subjects who are under the influence of a powerful Indian anesthetic, Nind Andhera, which he calls the "Black Sleep". Once he has finished his experiment, surviving subjects are revived and placed, in seriously degenerated and mutilated states, in a hidden cellar in the gloomy, abandoned country abbey where he conducts his experiments. Cast *Basil Rathbone as Sir Joel Cadman *Akim Tamiroff as Udu the Gypsy *Herbert Rudley as Dr. Gordon Ramsay *Patricia Blake as Laurie Munroe *Phyllis Stanley as Daphnae *Lon Chaney Jr. as Dr. Munroe aka Mungo *John Carradine as "Bohemund" *Bela Lugosi as Casimir *Tor Johnson as Mr. Curry *George Sawaya as Sailor Subject *Sally Yarnell as Female Subject *Peter Gordon as Det. Sgt. Steele *Claire Carleton as Carmoda Daily *John Sheffield as Det. Redford *Clive Morgan as Roundsman Blevins *Louanna Gardner as Angelina Cadman *Aubrey Schenck as Prison Coroner's Aide (uncredited) Release Produced during 1955, the film was released to theaters in the early summer of 1956. This was just ahead of the TV syndication, through Screen Gems, of two decades of Universal monster movies, under the package title Shock Theater. Writer Higgins, director LeBorg, and stars Rathbone, Chaney, Carradine, and Lugosi had all been significantly associated with Universal horror films or related B movies. The Black Sleep is similar to Universal's two "houseful" of monster films released in the mid-40s, House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula, only relying on a completely new cadre of human monsters. Home Video The Black Sleep was released by Kino on Blu ray in 2016. It also contains audio commentary by Tom Weaver and David Schecter. See also *List of American films of 1956 References External links * * *[http://www.basilrathbone.net/films/blacksleep/ The Black Sleep] at Basilrathbone.net * Category:1950s horror films Category:1956 films Category:American films Category:American horror films Category:Films directed by Reginald Le Borg Category:Mad scientist films Category:Films set in the 1870s Category:United Artists films